Accra, Sept. 17, GNA - Leading writers and language arts experts from within and outside Africa are to participate in the 20th Annual Conference of the Pan African Writers' Association (PAWA) in Accra, from November 5-7, 2009.

They include Wole Soyinka (Nobel literature laureate), Dr. Mohammed Salmawy (President of the Egyptian Writers' Union) and Prof. Abiola Irele of Harvard University.

This year's conference will coincide with three major events on the continental calendar.

The first is the 20th anniversary of the founding of PAWA itself. The second is the 17th celebration of the International African Writers' Day which is marked annually on November 7, as established by the African Union.

The third is the Centenary Celebration of the birth of Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, first President of the Republic of Ghana and a leading Writer and thinker.

The theme for the celebration is "Language, Literature and Society in a Fractured World".

"We live today in a fractured world, a global economic crisis, the pandemic of HIV/AIDS, the suffocating humiliation of poverty, the crisis of governance, the injustice of the subordination of whole peoples as in the Israeli - Palestinian situation, local and not so local wars. "We believe that the answers are to be found in the written and spoken word - in a language and literature that enable men and women to capture the essence of the times and how the quality of their lives is tied to how they respond to present and future problems", the statement said.

It added that the historic 20th annual PAWA Conference "will thus explore the themes and how literature and language can and are responding to the current challenges". 17 Sept 09